Some interventions were not adequately accessed, e.g. cataract
lens replacement due to supply side constraints. Backlogs
of cataract blindness in the long waiting list was removed by
taking the surgical procedure out of the IP DRG system and
paying by a fixed fee schedule per case to hospitals and offering
surgical fees to surgeons. Central bargaining by NHSO had
brought down prices of soft lens significantly; hospitals can
choose to reimburse on an agreed rate or to use lens supplied
by the NHSO-negotiated vendors. Private hospitals with spare
capacity were contracted with the same conditions applied to
public hospitals. After the 2008 launch, numbers of cataract
operation doubled in 4 years, from 71 823 lens replaced in 2008
to 143 553 in 2012, see Figure 5